Religions

re·li·gion (rĭi-lĭij'ə?n)
n.

• Belief in and reverence for a supernatural power or powers regarded as creator and governor of the universe.
• A personal or institutionalized system grounded in such belief and worship.
• The life or condition of a person in a religious order.
• A set of beliefs, values, and practices based on the teachings of a spiritual leader.
• A cause, principle, or activity pursued with zeal or conscientious devotion.

get religion Informal.

• To become religious or devout.
• To resolve to end one's immoral behavior.

Thesaurus

religion

noun

• A system of religious belief: confession, creed, denomination, faith, persuasion, sect. See religion.

Encyclopedia

religion, a system of thought, feeling, and action that is shared by a group and that gives the members an object of devotion; a code of behavior by which individuals may judge the personal and social consequences of their actions; and a frame of reference by which individuals may relate to their group and their universe. Usually, religion concerns itself with that which transcends the known, the natural, or the expected; it is an acknowledgment of the extraordinary, the mysterious, and the supernatural. The religious consciousness generally recognizes a transcendent, sacred order and elaborates a technique to deal with the inexplicable or unpredictable elements of human experience in the world or beyond it.

Types of Religious Systems

The evolution of religion cannot be precisely determined owing to the lack of clearly distinguishable stages, but anthropological and historical studies of isolated cultures in various periods of development have suggested a typology but not a chronology. One type is found among some Australian aborigines who practice magic and fetishism (see fetish) but consider the powers therein to be not supernatural but an aspect of the natural world. Inability or refusal to divide real from preternatural and acceptance of the idea that inanimate objects may work human good or evil are sometimes said to mark a prereligious phase of thought. This is sometimes labeled naturism or animatism. It is characterized by a belief in a life force that itself has no definite characterization (see animism).

A second type of religion, represented by many Oceanic and African tribal beliefs, includes momentary deities (a tree suddenly falling on or in front of a person is malignant, although it was not considered “possessed” before or after the incident) and special deities (a particular tree is inhabited by a malignant spirit, or the spirits of dead villagers inhabit a certain grove or particular animals). In this category one must distinguish between natural and supernatural forces. This development is related to the emergence of objects of devotion, to rituals of propitiation, to priests and shamans, and to an individual sense of group participation in which the individual or the group is protected by, or against, supernatural beings and is expected to act singly or collectively in specific ways when in the presence of these forces (see ancestor worship; totem; spiritism).

In a third class of religion—usually heavily interlaced with fetishism—magic, momentary and special deities, nature gods, and deities personifying natural functions (such as the Egyptian solar god Ra, the Babylonian goddess of fertility Ishtar, the Greek sea-god Poseidon, and the Hindu goddess of death and destruction Kali) emerge and are incorporated into a system of mythology and ritual. Sometimes they take on distinctively human characteristics (see anthropomorphism).

Beyond these more elementary forms of religious expression there are what are commonly called the “higher religions.” Theologians and philosophers of religion agree that these religions embody a principle of transcendence, i.e., a concept, sometimes a godhead, that involves humans in an experience beyond their immediate personal and social needs, an experience known as “the sacred” or “the holy.”

In the comparative study of these religions certain classifications are used. The most frequent are polytheism (as in popular Hinduism and ancient Greek religion), in which there are many gods; dualism (as in Zoroastrianism and certain Gnostic sects), which conceives of equally powerful deities of good and of evil; monotheism (as in Christianity, Judaism, and Islam), in which there is a single god; supratheism (as in Hindu Vedanta and certain Buddhist sects), in which the devotee participates in the religion through a mystical union with the godhead; and pantheism, in which the universe is identified with God.

Another frequently used classification is based on the origins of the body of knowledge held by a certain religion: some religions are revealed, as in Judaism (where God revealed the Commandments to Moses), Christianity (where Christ, the Son of God, revealed the Word of the Father), and Islam (where the angel Gabriel revealed God's will to Muhammad). Some religions are nonrevealed, or “natural,” the result of human inquiry alone. Included among these and sometimes called philosophies of eternity are Buddhist sects (where Buddha is recognized not as a god but as an enlightened leader), Brahmanism, and Taoism and other Chinese metaphysical doctrines.

Bibliography

See J. Wach, Comparative Study of Religions (1951, repr. 1958); J. G. Frazer, The Golden Bough (3d ed., 13 vol., 1955; repr. 1966); V. T. A. Ferm, Encyclopedia of Religion (1959); J. Hick, The Philosophy of Religion (1963); J. de Vries, The Study of Religion (tr. 1967); G. Parrinder, ed., Man and His Gods (1971); M. Eliade, ed., Encyclopedia of Religion (16 vol., 1986); E. L. Queen 2d et al., ed., The Encyclopedia of American Religious History (1996).

WordNet

Note: click on a word meaning below to see its connections and related words.

The noun religion has 2 meanings:

Meaning #1: a strong belief in a supernatural power or powers that control human destiny
Synonyms: faith, religious belief

Meaning #2: institution to express belief in a divine power
Synonym: faith

American History

Religion

"Upon my arrival in the United States," Alexis de Tocqueville wrote in 1835, "the religious aspect of the country was the first thing that struck my attention." Throughout American history visitors have remarked on the religious character of the United States. G. K. Chesterton, for instance, concluded that America thought of itself in religious terms and that the United States was "a nation with the soul of a church."

Indeed, the statistics are staggering. Gallup poll data tell us that 94 percent of Americans believe in God or a universal spirit, as compared with 76 percent of the British, 62 percent of the French, and 52 percent of the Swedes. In addition, 65 percent of Americans claim membership in a church or synagogue, and 42 percent attend religious services in any given week.

Thus, Americans are undeniably a religious people. To a remarkable degree, many seek to fashion their conduct around religious principles, and their religious communities very often define their social networks. Extolling the unique religious character of the United States has become a staple of political discourse. Throughout their history Americans have believed that their country occupies a special place in the divine plan. When Thomas Prince sat down early in the eighteenth century to write his history of New England, he felt compelled to begin his narrative with the Genesis account of creation, so confident was he of America's special place in providential history. The Puritans saw themselves as the New Israel, fleeing the Egypt of England for the Promised Land of Massachusetts. Even Benjamin Franklin, so much a man of the Enlightenment, proposed that the seal of the United States depict Moses leading the children of Israel across the Red Sea.

In addition to historical identifications with ancient Israel, millennial notions have also shaped American self-identity and its hopes for the future. No less a thinker than Jonathan Edwards believed that the millennium would begin in Northampton, Massachusetts. Joseph Smith taught his followers that the center stake of Zion would be in Jackson County, Missouri. Countless religious visionaries have decided that America would provide the most fertile soil for constructing one sort of utopia or another. America's sense of destiny has also filtered into political rhetoric. One has only to chart the political slogans through the centuries--John Winthrop's "Citty upon a Hill" in the seventeenth century, "the sacred cause of liberty" during the revolutionary era, "manifest destiny" in the nineteenth century, "making the world safe for democracy" in the twentieth--to get a sense of America's belief in its divine mission.

Undeniably, the hyperbole of political rhetoric notwithstanding, religion has played an important role in America's history. Spanish conquistadors bore the standard of Christianity to the New World, although they were clearly not averse to filling the king's coffers and lining their own pockets with booty. The Pilgrims, exiled from England and uneasy with their new lives in the Netherlands, sought religious refuge across the Atlantic. The Puritans, who followed a decade later, had a more ambitious agenda --to demonstrate to the world the workings of a true church purified of all vestiges of Roman Catholicism--but by the close of the seventeenth century their quest for profits had unmistakably compromised their professions of piety. The religious motivations of other settlers--the Dutch, the Swedes, the Scots-Irish, the Anglicans--are considerably less obvious, although it is clear that the Huguenots fled religious persecution in France after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685. Roger Williams, Lord Baltimore, and William Penn all envisioned havens of religious toleration in the New World.

The religious pluralism that characterized colonial America demanded some kind of unique accommodation in the polity of the new nation. Indeed, religious establishment--the designation of a particular religious group or denomination as favored by civil authorities and therefore eligible to receive public revenues--had proved impractical in most of the colonies outside of New England. Protestant leaders such as Isaac Backus and William Livingston joined Thomas Jefferson and Enlightenment deists in an unlikely alliance to ensure religious toleration and disestablishment. Far from crippling religious expression, as the Congregationalists of New England had feared, disestablishment instead created a salubrious religious climate in America. The First Amendment, with its proscription against religious establishment and its guarantee of religious freedom, has set up a kind of free market of religion in America, where religious "entrepreneurs" of all stripes--Joseph Smith, Ellen Gould White, Mary Baker Eddy, Elijah Muhammad, Jimmy Swaggart, Robert Schuller--have competed for popular followings in the marketplace of ideas.

This playing to popular tastes has doubtlessly compromised religious orthodoxy and rigor. Indeed, another peculiar characteristic about religion in America is its latitudinarianism. With the exception of Jonathan Edwards and Reinhold Niebuhr, Americans have rarely distinguished themselves as theologians; they tend to be rather eclectic in their beliefs, with little regard for consistency. But what you believe is less important than belief itself, or at least the trappings of spirituality. One has only to glance in the direction of the vitiated religious establishments in other Western nations to understand the contrast. Whereas other peoples become passionate about politics, Americans are passionate about religion, and in any priority of personal disclosure most Americans would divulge their religious views before their political affiliations.

No era of American history better demonstrates the influence of religion on public life than the nineteenth century, particularly the antebellum period. The revival fires of the Second Great Awakening unleashed an unprecedented reforming impulse in the new nation, much of it directed toward the establishment of a millennial kingdom in America. Americans were so steeped in optimism about the perfectibility of individuals and the amelioration of society that they organized benevolent and reform societies--temperance reform, abolitionism, female suffrage, prison reform--with a zealotry unmatched in American history. Religious sensibilities pervaded American culture, often mixing with nationalism and xenophobia--witness the nativist sentiment directed against non-Protestant immigrants, as well as McGuffey's Reader of the nineteenth century, with its unabashed celebration of Protestantism and patriotism.

But if Protestantism's influence on American culture has been pervasive, its hold has never been hegemonic. Indeed, Americans' religious imagination has been limitless, giving rise to all manner of permutations and innovations--restorationism, Mormonism, Christian Science, transcendentalism, Jehovah's Witnesses, the Moorish Science Temple, Jewish Reconstructionism, the Nation of Islam, and countless others. All are indigenous American religions, and all have won a place--and at least a measure of respectability--in the marketplace of ideas. Indeed, the challenge facing Americans over the last century has been the accommodation of the nation's religious pluralism, a concession that some of the more conservative Protestants have been reluctant to grant, especially to non-Christian traditions such as Hinduism, Buddhism, and Islam.

Religious sensibilities have shaped American culture beyond the realm of politics. Sunday blue laws persisted well into the twentieth century, and the Methodist township of Ocean Grove, New Jersey, managed to ban automobiles from its streets every Sunday until a court decision in 1979 declared the law unconstitutional. United States coins and currency bear the inscription, "In God We Trust." Sunday schools began in the late eighteenth century to provide a rudimentary education for children of the working poor, but as common schools grew in popularity during the succeeding decades, Sunday schools provided religious instruction and served as a significant means of recruitment for Protestant churches. Public schools, however, shed their Protestant biases only slowly, and this reluctance prompted the great school wars in New York and Philadelphia over what amounted, Roman Catholics charged, to Protestant catechetical instruction in the public schools. At the Third Plenary Council in 1884, Catholics responded with an ambitious program of parochial schooling to educate and socialize Catholic children in the faith. The "school wars" of the twentieth century placed conservative Protestants on the defensive. Ever since the Supreme Court's 1963 decision banning prayer in public schools, fundamentalists have urged a reversal of that decision, and they have launched desultory efforts either to ban the teaching of evolutionary theory or, once that battle was lost, to insist that public schools teach the Genesis account of creation alongside of Darwinism.

Historically, religion has shaped higher education in America as well. A large portion of the nation's most prestigious universities trace their origins to confessional or sectarian motivations: Harvard, Yale, and Dartmouth (Congregational); the College of William and Mary and Columbia (Anglican); Princeton (Presbyterian); Brown (Baptist); Georgetown (Jesuit). Although many of these institutions have slipped their religious moorings, others--Notre Dame, Southern Methodist, Brigham Young--have remained rather more faithful to their origins. In addition, hundreds of colleges throughout the country were begun by religious groups in an effort to expand their influence on American culture--Colby (Baptist), Connecticut Wesleyan (Methodist), Davidson (Presbyterian), Gettysburg (Lutheran), Kenyon (Episcopal), to name only a few.

Indeed, the aggregate influence of religion upon American culture is so great as to be incalculable, but the reverse is true as well: religion in America bears a distinctive cultural stamp. More than anything else it is marked by a disregard for tradition and precedent. The New World attracted adventurers, people disenchanted in one way or another with the existing order, many of whom fled the institutional constraints of the Old World. They brought with them a willingness to experiment and even a passion for novelty. The United States was the first modern, Western nation founded by Protestants, not Catholics. Protestantism, which by its very definition defies tradition, did not have to overcome the ossified European institutions of churches and universities; instead, the New World allowed Protestants to start anew.

The other peculiar characteristic of religion in America derives from its populist character. Lacking confessional boundaries and institutional constraints, religious groups very often coalesce around a charismatic individual who defines the faith, beliefs, and practices of his or her followers. In the twentieth century, the media have allowed a number of religious figures to exploit that circumstance to their advantage and build large empires of radio and television stations, colleges, seminaries, and even, however briefly, an amusement park.

Religion in America has had oddly divergent influences on American life, in some cases challenging and in other cases defending the status quo. Northern Protestants of the antebellum period pushed a comprehensive agenda of social reform. The Social Gospel movement at the turn of the century sought to redress the ravages of urban life. Dorothy Day and the Catholic Worker movement advocated workers' rights and even socialism. The "peace churches"--Quakers, Mennonites, and others--have faced censure, ridicule, and even the distraint of goods in times of war. Jews and Christians cooperated in the civil rights struggle against Jim Crow laws and against the mores of southern culture.

Religion, however, has generally exerted a conservative influence on American life--witness the unabashed celebration of patriotic values in McGuffey's Reader, the identification of capitalism with Christianity by powerful churchmen such as John D. Rockefeller, the fundamentalist political resurgence since 1975, and the fierce conservatism of the Mormons, despite their persecution at the hands of federal authorities in the nineteenth century. Religion in America rarely challenges the political or social order; when it does, it usually does so only to champion so-called traditional values or to evoke a halcyon past when America was purportedly even more religious. On such occasions it calls upon and thereby perpetuates the enduring mythology of America as a Christian nation and Americans as God's chosen people.

Twenty, fifty, and even a hundred years ago, the conventional wisdom of modernization and secularization theorists was that as any nation modernizes and industrializes, religion would be pushed to the periphery. America's persistent spirituality, however, has confounded those experts. In the United States, surely among the most modern and industrialized nations on earth, religion remains very much a part of both private life and public discourse.

Bibliography:

Sidney E. Ahlstrom, A Religious History of the American People (1972); Mark A. Noll, One Nation under God? Christian Faith and Political Action in America (1988).

Author:

Randall Balmer

See also A.M.E. Church; Black Churches; Blue Laws; Christian Science; Church and State; Deism; Evangelicalism; Great Awakening; Jews; Missionaries; Mormons; Puritanism; Quakers; Roman Catholic Church; Second Great Awakening; Shakers; Social Gospel; Transcendentalism; and entries for individual religious figures.

Wikipedia

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religion

Religion—sometimes used interchangeably with faith or belief system—is commonly defined as belief concerning the supernatural, sacred, or divine, and the moral codes, practices and institutions associated with such belief. In its broadest sense some have defined it as the sum total of answers given to explain humankind's relationship with the universe. In the course of the development of religion, it has taken a huge number of forms in various cultures and individuals. Occasionally, the word "religion" is used to designate what should be more properly described as a "religious organization" – that is, an organization of people that supports the exercise of some religion, often taking the form of a legal entity (see religion-supporting organization).

Borobudur, a Buddhist stupa built between 750 and 850

Fishers of men; Oil on panel by Adriaen van de Venne (1614)

The nature and content of religion

Etymology

The word religion is thought to derive from one of two combinations of Latin roots. The first is re + legio or "re-reading," a meaning attributed by Cicero to describe the repetition of scripture. The second interpretation, favoured by more modern scholars such as Tom Harpur, is re + ligio or "reconnection." However, some take the Latin term "ligio" (as in ligament) in the sense of "bind" rather than "connect," hence interpreting "religion" as "returning to bondage."

Defining "religion"

Beyond the above, very broad definition of religion, there are a variety of uses and meanings for the word "religion." Some of the approaches are as follows:

• · One definition, sometimes called the "function-based approach," defines religion as any set of beliefs and practices that have the function of addressing the fundamental questions of human identity, ethics, death and the existence of the Divine (if any). This broad definition encompasses all systems of belief, including those that affirm the existence of one God, and those that affirm the existence of many gods.
• · A second definition, sometimes called the "form-based approach," defines religion as any set of beliefs which makes claims that lie beyond the realm of scientific observation, according to some authority or personal experience with the Divine. This narrower definition places "religion" in contradistinction with rationalism, secular humanism, atheism, objectivist philosophy, and agnosticism, which do not appeal to authority or personal experience in coming to their beliefs, but instead rely on epistemology.
• · A third definition, sometimes called the "physical evidence approach," defines religion as the beliefs about cause and effect that Occam's Razor would remove as recognizing causes that are more than what is both true and sufficient to explain the physical evidence. By this definition then, non-religion is any set of beliefs that admits no more causes of natural things than such as are both true and sufficient to explain their appearance. This view is typically held by those who describe themselves as "non-religious," but also by religious people who see "faith" and "science" as totally separate means of attaining knowledge. It is typically rejected by those people, religious and non-religious, who see metaphysical claims as necessary to explain natural phenomena at a fundamental level.
• · A fourth definition, sometimes called the "organizational approach," defines religion as the formal institutions, creeds, organizations, practices, and rules of conduct, of all major, institutionalized religions. This definition places "religion" in contradistinction to "spirituality," and therefore does not include the claims "spirituality" makes to actual contact, service, or worship of the Divine. In this definition, however, religion and spirituality are not mutually exclusive: a religious person may be spiritual or unspiritual, and a spiritual person may be religious or non-religious.

Questions that religions address

Jesus Christ, oil painting by Roland Walleij.

Religions are systems of belief which typically seek to answer questions about the following issues:

• · Creation beliefs, which seek to explain the origin of the universe, the Earth, life, and humanity;
• · Beliefs regarding the existence (or non-existence) and nature of Deity (or Deities) (cf God), the divine, the sacred and the supernatural;
• · Beliefs regarding human nature;
• · Beliefs regarding the appropriate means and methods for relating to the divine, the sacred, other people, animals, the natural world around us, and ourselves
• · Beliefs regarding the nature of morality and ethics, including moral objectivism and moral relativism;
• · Means to identify and celebrate the experience of supreme value;
• · A sense of identity seeking to achieve completeness in relation to all wants and desires;
• · Development of a purpose in life, and the identification of appropriate goals for life;
• · An ethical framework, including a definition of activities which are "good" and "bad";
• · Beliefs regarding other possible states of being like heaven, nirvana, purgatory or hell, and how to prepare for them;
• · Explanations for and understandings of the existence of evil and suffering, and the articulation of a theodicy;

Religious practices

Practices based upon religious beliefs typically include:

• · Prayer
• · Worship
• · Regular assembly with other believers
• · A priesthood or clergy or some other religious functionary to lead and/or help the adherents of the religion
• · Ceremonies and/or traditions unique to the set of beliefs
• · A means of preserving adherence to the canonical beliefs and practice of that religion
• · Codes for behaviour in other aspects of life to ensure consistency with the set of beliefs, i.e., a moral code, like the ten yamas (restraints) of Hinduism or the Ten Commandments of the Old Testament, flowing from the beliefs rather than being defined by the beliefs, with the moral code often being elevated to the status of a legal code that is enforced by followers of that religion
• · Maintenance and study of scripture, or texts they hold as sacred uniquely different from other writings, and which records or is the basis of the fundamental beliefs of that religion

Contrasts among religions

Religions diverge widely with regard in the answers they provide to the questions listed above, and the practices of the religious faithful. For example:

Number of gods

The syllable Aum or ॐ? is the primordial mantra in Vedic tradition.

• · Monotheistic religions assert that there is one God, distinct and separate from Nature as we understand it. Examples include Judaism, Darraghism, Ayyavazhi, Sikhism, Christianity, Islam, the áíBah' Faith, and the dualistic schools of Hinduism, including the Dvaita school of Vaishnavism, and the dualist Saiva Siddhanta school of Shaivism. The more prevalent form of monotheism present in Hinduism which differs from the monotheism prevalent in Semitic religions is monistic theism .
• · Many Christians believe in trinitarianism, which asserts that there is one God with three persons. (The majority of Christian denominations hold this, with some exceptions, e.g. Oneness Pentecostals, Jehovah's Witnesses, Montanism, Sabellianism.)
• · Henotheistic religions assert that there are many gods and/or deities of varying attributes, but One God is ultimately supreme. Examples include the strains of Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism (especially Shaivism and Vaishnavism), that acknowledge angels, demons, devas, asuras, or other gods of whom the One God is greatest, as well as many animistic traditions, particularly in Africa.
• · Some Deists believe that there was a God at the beginning of the universe, but either that God has ceased to exist (see The Second Coming (TV) for an example of this applied to Christianity), or has ceased to interact with the material world;
• · Polytheistic religions such as Greco-Roman religion and certain aspects of Mormonism assert that there are many gods;
• · Pantheistic and Panentheistic, or "natural" religions believe that God and everything in nature are aspects of a continuous spiritual plane, and are thus essentially inseparable. Pantheistic religions equate all of existence with the Divine (the Creator and the created are one), whereas panentheistic religions hold that the created universe is within the Creator. Examples include (to various degrees): the pantheistic and panentheistic schools of Shaivism and Vaishnavism in Hinduism, Shintoism, and some animistic traditions.
• · Non-theistic religions (such as Buddhism) make no claim as to the existence or non-existence of God;
• · Atheistic religions (such as Jainism and Secular Humanism) do not believe in a god, gods or goddesses.;
• · Out of point of interest agnostics will often talk in terms of not knowing the number of gods, whether it be thousands, one, or zero.

Gender of gods

Main article: God and gender.

• · Some religious individuals describe their gods as being without gender, and embodying both traditionally masculine and traditionally feminine attributes;
• · Some religious individuals describe their gods as being without gender, but having many traditionally masculine characteristics.
• · Other religious individuals describe their gods as being without gender, but having many traditionally feminine characteristics.
• · Other religions describe gods as being tangibly masculine or feminine. Examples include traditional mythological religions.

Sources of authority

12th century Andalusian Qur'an

• · Sacred Texts provide authority to believers who regard the text as authoritative, divinely dictated, divinely inspired, and/or inerrant. Examples include the Qur'an, the Vedas, the áKitb-i-Aqdas and the Bible;
• · Prophets provide authority to believers who regard the prophet as having either spectacular personal insight, or direct personal communication with the Divine. Examples include Jesus, Buddha, Moses, ááBah'u'llh, and Muhammad;
• · Science and Reason provide authority to believers who regard science and reason as providing answers to many of the fundamental questions asked and answered by religion. Examples include Secular Humanism, and some atheists;
• · Tradition provides authority to believers who regard the customs of their ancestors to be particularly important and a source of Divine Truth; examples include Shamanism and some aspects of Shintoism;
• · Personal Experience provides authority to believers who believe they have had personal contact with Deity or Deities, or some other event of particular religious significance to them.

Organizational structure

• · Centralized religions develop a highly structured organization intended to develop and assure doctrinal purity, and aid believers in their efforts to life by that faith. Examples include Roman Catholicism, early Islam, and Hassidic Judaism;
• · Decentralized religions develop independent of any centralizing force, and therefore demonstrate a great deal of variety with regard to belief and practice. Examples include Hinduism, the mythologies of ancient Greece and Egypt, and modern Pagan revivals such as Wicca or Áúsatr (see also Neopaganism).

Ethical focus

• · Behavior-based religions emphasize the importance of a believer participating in certain customs, rituals, and behaviors. Examples include Hasidic Judaism, and many animistic traditions;
• · Spiritual Philosophy religions emphasize extensive practical teachings for achieving human happiness or equanimity in the natural world with a lesser focus on the supernatural. Examples: Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism. Others like Hinduism emphasize such beliefs but still do believe in a personal, supreme God which can be expressed in a variety of ways.
• · Relationship-based religions emphasize the maintenance of a proper relationship with the Divine, either by Personal Relationship (in the case of Evangelical Christianity), by obedience and submission to God's Will (in the case of Islam), or repentance and forgiveness for sin (in the case of traditional Christianity).
• · Ideologically-based religions emphasize the achievement of some earthly ideological goal. Some, such as Communism, developed the traditionally "religious" attributes of "sacred" texts, rituals, and the near-deification of certain leaders.

Afterlife

• · Hinduism asserts that humans are continually reborn, until they reach Moksha, a state of union with God or Saguna Brahman expressed as Vishnu or Shiva or as what followers of the Advaita school believe, union with the Impersonal Absolute and that one's good or evil behavior in this life determines the course of one's next life; accordingly, Hinduism does not believe in eternal damnation as God gives us many chances through subsequent reincarnations until we reach moksha. However, many Hindus believe there is a purgatory-like state analogous to Christianity where Yama, the Hindu deva, or Lord of Death, punishes humans before they reincarnate again.
• · Theravada Buddhism asserts that a person's Kamma is continually reborn until they attain Nirvana, and that rebirth is undesirable; Mahayana Buddhism is more in line with Hinduism with regard to certain beliefs on reincarnation. However, Buddhism's state of nirvana is not analogous to the Hindu concept of Moksha as Nirvana is a state of non-being or voidness and does not focus on the concept of a personal, Supreme Being that is allowed in Advaita and is mandated in the strict theistic schools such as that of Ramanuja and Madhva.
• · Christianity and Islam have a Heaven and Hell, and God as judge to decide our eternal fate. Beyond that common ground, however, belief varies widely within the religions.
• · Catholicism asserts that individuals are saved by declaring faith in God, but are still subject to punishment for unrepented sin at death, which is purified in purgatory;
• · Traditional Protestantism asserts that individuals are saved purely by declaring their belief in the saving power of Jesus's death and resurrection;
• · Some other Christians believe that individuals choose their own heaven or hell: if a person chooses to live in a self-created "Hell on Earth," they continue to choose that after death, and God ultimately gives them what they wish: distance from God and Joy. On the other hand, people that seek "Heaven on Earth" continue to seek Heaven after death, and God gives them what they desire: nearness of God, and Joy. See, for example, "The Great Divorce," by C.S. Lewis.
• · Under most traditional Islamic belief, God judges us on the basis of our adherence to the five pillars of Islam, including acknowledgement of God, Muhammad, and living according to God's laws of Justice, Faith, and Mercy, and rewards us according to our acts on Earth.
• · Judaism makes no particular claims regarding the afterlife. In fact, to treat judaism as having an afterlife is (to the Jews) pagan idolatry.
• · The áíBah' Faith asserts that a person's soul continues to progress in the spiritual worlds of God after death until it reaches God. The purpose of this world is for the soul to acquire spiritual qualities (or virtues) so that it is closer to God once physical death occurs.
• · Rastafarians believe in Physical Immortality. Once their God Haile Selassie calls the Day of Judgement and takes them home to Africa and Zion they will live with him forever in their current physical bodies and on this current physical plane.
• · Jehovah's_Witnesses believe that until Armageddon, the dead are in a sleeping state, unable to hear prayers or intervene in the physical world. 144,000 "anointed" ones ascend to Heaven to rule beside Jesus Christ after Satan is defeated in Armageddon, and subsequently abyssed. The dead who had not come to know Jehovah are resurrected and are gradually granted perfection on a paradise Earth. After 1000 years, Satan is unsealed and allowed to tempt mankind once more. Those who sin then die forever with Satan, and Jehovah takes over rulership from Jesus.

Approaches to relating to the beliefs of others

Adherents of particular religions deal with the differing doctrines and practices espoused by other religions in a variety ways. All strains of thought appear in different segments of all major world religions.

Exclusivism

People with exclusivist beliefs typically explain other religions as either in error, or as corruptions or counterfeits of the true faith. Examples include:

• · Christians believe Jesus said: "I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but through me." John 14:6.
• · The Qur'an states: "O you who believe! Do not take the Jews and the Christians for friends; they are friends of each other; and whoever amongst you takes them for a friend, then surely he is one of them; surely Allah does not guide the unjust people." Qur'an 5:51.
• · Judaism maintains that God said to Israel through Moses: "You have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself. Now, therefore, if you will obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my own possession among all peoples; for all the earth is mine, and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation."

Inclusivism

People with inclusivist beliefs recognize some truth in all faith systems, highlighting agreements and minimizing differences, but see their own faith as in some way ultimate. Examples include:

• · From Hinduism:
• · A well-known Rig Vedic hymn stemming from Hinduism claims that "Truth is One, though the sages know it variously."
• · Krishna, incarnation or avatar of Vishnu, the supreme God in Hinduism, said in the Gita: In whatever way men identify with Me, in the same way do I carry out their desires; men pursue My path, O Arjuna, in all ways. (Gita:4:11);

Lord Krishna

• · Krishna said: "Whatever deity or form a devotee worships, I make his faith steady. However, their wishes are only granted by Me." (Gita: 7:21-22)
• · Another quote in the Gita states: "O Arjuna, even those devotees who worship other lesser deities (e.g., Devas, for example) with faith, they also worship Me, but in an improper way because I am the Supreme Being. I alone am the enjoyer of all sacrificial services (Seva, Yajna) and Lord of the universe." (Gita: 9:23)
• · From Christianity:
• · Jesus said, "He who is not against me is for me." Mark 9:40.
• · Jesus said, "Everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but those who blaspheme against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven." Luke 12:10.
• · The Apostle Peter wrote of God: "He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance." 2 Peter 3:9 (NIV)
• · An aphorism common in some Christian circles: "All Truth is God's Truth."
• · From Islam:
• · The Qur'an states: "Only argue with the People of the Book in the kindest way - except in the case of those of them who do wrong - saying, 'We have faith in what has been sent down to us and what was sent down to you. Our God and your God are one and we submit to Him.'" (Holy Qur'an, Surat al-'Ankabut; 29:46)
• · "Among the people of the Book there are some who have iman in Allah and in what has been sent down to you and what was sent down to them, and who are humble before Allah. They do not sell Allah's Signs for a paltry price. Such people will have their reward with their Lord. And Allah is swift at reckoning." (Holy Qur'an, Surat Al 'Imran; 3:199)
• · "...You will find the people most affectionate to those who have iman are those who say, 'We are Christians.' That is because some of them are priests and monks and because they are not arrogant." (Holy Qur'an, Surat al-Ma'ida; 5:82)
• · From Judaism:
• · The Talmud states: "The righteous of all peoples have a place in the World-To-Come" (Tos. to Sanhedrin 13:2, Sifra to Leviticus 19:18), and affirms that the great majority of non-Jewish humanity will be saved, due to God's overwhelming mercy (BT Sanhedrin 105a).
• · The Torah mentions a number of righteous gentiles, including Melchizedek who presided at offerings to God that Abraham made (Gen. 14:18), Job, a pagan Arab of the land of Uz who had a whole book of the Hebrew Bible devoted to him as a paragon of righteousness beloved of God (see the book of Job), and the Ninevites, the people given to cruelty and idolatry could be accepted by God when they repented (see the Book of Jonah).
• · Rabbinic tradition asserts that the basic standard of righteousness was established in a covenant with Noah: anyone who keeps the seven commandments of this covenant is assured of salvation, no matter what their religion. This is standard Jewish teaching for the past two thousand years.
• · From the Bahá'í Faith:
• · Shoghi Effendi, the Guardian of the Bahá'í Faith states: "The fundamental principle enunciated by Bahá'u'lláh, the followers of His Faith firmly believe, is that religious truth is not absolute but relative, that Divine Revelation is a continuous and progressive process, that all the great religions of the world are divine in origin, that their basic principles are in complete harmony, that their aims and purposes are one and the same, that their teachings are but facets of one truth, that their functions are complementary, that they differ only in the nonessential aspects of their doctrines, and that their missions represent successive stages in the spiritual evolution of human society." (The Faith of Bahá'u'lláh" in World Order, Vol. 7, No. 2 (1972-73)) [1] (http://www.bic-un.bahai.org/47-0701.htm)

Pluralism

Main article: Religious pluralism

People with pluralist beliefs make no distinction between faith systems, viewing each one as valid within a particular culture. Examples include:

• · The Qur'an, revealed through Muhammad, states, "Those with Faith, those who are Jews, and the Christians and Sabaeans, all who have Faith in Allah and the Last Day and act rightly will have their reward with their Lord. They will feel no fear and will know no sorrow." (Qur'an, Surat al-Baqara; 2:62)
• · The Christian writer Paul wrote, "God "will give to each person according to what he has done." To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honor and immortality, he will give eternal life. But for those who are self seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil, there will be wrath and anger. There will be trouble and distress for every human being who does evil: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile; but glory, honor and peace for everyone who does good: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. For God does not show favouritism. All who sin apart from the law will also perish apart from the law, and all who sin under the law will be judged by the law. For it is not those who hear the law who are righteous in God's sight, but it is those who obey the law who will be declared righteous. (Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themseleves, even though they do not have the law, since they show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts now accusing, now even defending them.)" Romans 2:6-15.

Syncretism

Main article: Syncretism

People with syncretistic views blend the views of a variety of different religions or traditional beliefs into a unique fusion which suits their particular experience and context.

Unitarian-Universalism is an example of a syncretistic faith.

Religion in relation to other closely related topics

Religion and spirituality

It is common to distinguish the concept of "religion" from the concept of "spirituality."

Individuals who ascribe to this distinction see spirituality as a belief in ideas of religious significance (such as God, the Soul, or Heaven) without being bound to the bureaucratic structure and creeds of a particular organized religion. They choose the term spirituality rather than religion to describe their form of belief, perhaps reflecting a large-scale disillusionment with organized religion that is occurring in much of the Western world (see Religion in modernity), and a movement towards a more "modern" — more tolerant, and more intuitive — form of religion.

Many members of organized religion, of course, see no significant difference between the two terms, because they see spirituality at the heart of their religion, and see the church organization as a means of preserving that spirituality. Many of them associate themselves with an organized religion because they see the religious community as a means of maintaining and strengthening their Faith in fellowship with other believers. They see amorphous "spirituality" movements as "religions of convenience," in which individuals can choose whatever beliefs make them feel comfortable at the time, without being bound to any external standard of accountability.

Finally, it should be noted that many individuals, while still associating themselves with an organized religion, see a distinction between the mundane, earthly aspects of their religion and the spiritual dimension. They note that people may take part in organized religion purely for mundane reasons, for example, gaining security from such things as regular attendance at churches or temples, or the social comfort of fervently agreeing with other believers; they note that this sometimes is done without a corresponding spiritual dimension. They then conclude that such behavior is "religious" without being "spiritual." Further, some aspects of religion (for example, the Catholic Inquisition or Islamic Terrorism), are seen as completely contrary to the teachings of the religions' founders, who many believe taught tolerance and love. In support of this belief that religions may "lose their way," many cite things such as Jesus' criticism of the Pharisees, who represented organized religion in his context.

As a result, many who consider themselves deeply involved with the Divine may have come to reject much of the recognised aspects of established religion, in an effort to free themselves of the mundane trappings or perceived corruption of "religion."

Religion and science

Generally speaking, religion and science use different methods in their effort to ascertain Truth and knowledge. Religion utilises methods that are based upon subjective interpretation of personal intuition or experience, and/or on the authority of a perceived prophet or a sacred text, through revelation. Science, on the other hand, uses the scientific method; an objective process of investigation based upon physical evidence, subject only to observable and verifiable phenomena. Secularists see religion as a form of Superstition.

Similarly, there are two types of questions which religion and science attempt to answer: questions of observable and verifiable phenomena (such as the laws of physics, or human behaviour), and questions of unobservable phenomena and value judgments (such as how the laws of physics came to be, and what is "good" and "bad").

People apply the two methods to the two categories of questions in a variety of ways.

• · Some apply religious methods to all questions, both observable and unobservable. For example, based on observations made through meditation, Theravada Buddhists claim that despite appearances, nothing (even the human ego) exists in and of itself, but only as a conceptual reference point in an otherwise fluid universe. Many see this as a contradiction of the scientific worldview, which is predicated on the objective and separate existence of material phenomena. Many Buddhists do not see this as a contradiction.
• · Some apply religious methods to most questions, and apply scientific methods to a few; for example, up to the mid-16th Century most clergy and natural philosophers asserted, from purported Biblical authority, that the Earth was the center of the universe and subject to certain natural laws, despite physical evidence that the Earth was not the center of the universe, and subject to radically different laws.
• · Some apply religious methods only to questions of the unobservable and values, and apply scientific methods only to questions of the observable and verifiable; for instance, those that note the empirical evidence of evolution today, but assert from a religious basis that a supernatural God created the Universe and all the laws and phenomena therein.
• · Some apply scientific methods to most questions, and apply religious methods to a few; for example, many atheists assert that there is no God for lack of empirical evidence, but still assert that there are fundamental moral laws and values that man ought to follow, a priori.
• · Some claim to apply scientific methods to all questions, both scientific and philosophical; for example, Nihilists and Materialists, who assert that Science necessitates certain philosophical, unobservable, unverifiable, and value-laden conclusions of a strongly religious nature, such as the superiority of certain races, the inevitability of proletarian rule, or the meaninglessness of life. Others assert that moral behavior and altruism emerge naturally from biological evolution (c.f. Sociobiology)

Religion and myth

Shrine of the Bab in Haifa, Israel

The word "myth" has two meanings, according to the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary:

• a person or thing having only an imaginary or unverifiable existence
• a usually traditional story of ostensibly historical events that serves to unfold part of the world view of a people or explain a practice, belief, or natural phenomenon

Myth as "mere story"

Ancient polytheistic religions, such as those of ancient Greece, ancient Rome, the Vikings, etc., are often studied under the heading of mythology. Religions of pre-industrial peoples, or cultures in development to industrial conditions, are similarly observed by the anthropology of religion. Mythology can be a term used pejoratively by religious and non-religious people both, by defining another person's religious stories and beliefs as mythology. Here myths are treated as fantasies, or "mere" stories.

Myth as defining and explaining belief

The term myth in sociology, however has a non-pejorative meaning, defined as stories that are important for the group and not necessarily untrue. Examples include the death and resurrection of Jesus (which, to Christians, explains the means by which they are freed from sin, as well as being ostensibly historical).

Religion and Occam's Razor

Occam's Razor is the principle that one should not take more assumptions than needed. When multiple explanations are available for a phenomenon, the simplest version is preferred. When deciding between two models which make equivalent predictions, choose the simpler one. Gravity, while more complicated in some ways than a magic stone, has predictive powers that are lacking in a theory of a magic stone causing things to fall and the planets to move in the sky. Thus a magic stone being a simpler theory is irrelevant because it doesn't make equivelently accurate and complete predictions.

Some, such as atheists, secular humanists, and agnostics assert that Occam's Razor makes belief in divine intervention unreasonable. This is because some religions require an individual to make many more assumptions regarding causes in the natural world than Atheistic and Naturalistic explanations require. For instance, some religious beliefs require the believer to assume that an invisible God created the universe, is concerned with our moral behavior for some reason, yet does not reveal himself, and will judge us after death for decisions we made in relative ignorance, sending us to either an assumed Heaven or an assumed Hell. Atheists conclude that such beliefs require myriad assumptions, while naturalistic explanations require significantly fewer assumptions and that the religious beliefs are therefore less reasonable than naturalistic ones. It is important to understand that all predictive knowledge is being refered to here. It does no good to have fewer assumptions in each of a hundred areas of knowledge, yet more assumptions altogether. Also information of a nonpredictive or nonobjective kind is not the kind of knowledge dealt with here. A personal judgement that belief in God is the best way to make sense of the voice in one's head is both subjective and mostly of little predictive power.

William of Occam was a Christian and Franciscan friar who used Occam's Razor to pare away various religious elements other than God around 1300 A.D., way before science had any reasonable theory to explain the existence of life, mind, or conciousness. Needless to say, knowledge has advanced since then, and what William's use of this principle named for him would be today is anyone's guess.

Approaches to the study of individual religions

Methods of studying religion subjectively (in relation to one's own beliefs)

These include efforts to determine the meaning and application of "sacred" texts and beliefs in the context of the student's personal worldview. This generally takes one of three forms:

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